The invention relates to a chocolate of reduced sweetness and to a process of producing the same, in which the flavor of main raw cacao material for the chocolate is improved to enrich the cacao.
For the purpose of producing a chocolate, there have been neither ideas nor practices for treating the material cacao with alkali. Heretofore, the cacao has been treated with alkali for another purpose, that is merely to improve an aroma, color, dispersibility in water and the like of cocoa powder.
Further, there have been several cases of the alkali-treatment of cacao other than production of cocoa powder. For example, an attempt of treating the cacao with an aqueous solution of weakly alkaline salt for the purpose of sterilization is disclosed in the Japanese Patent Publication No. 291233/1990. An attempt of neutralizing organic acids with ammonia for the purpose of improvement in aroma of cacao beans of low grade is disclosed in the Japanese Patent Publication No. 56975/1986. An attempt of increasing water-dispersibility of chocolate for food materials used in a pudding or jelly is disclosed in the Japanese Patent Publication No. 10094/1986.
On the other hand, a roasting process of cacao in which an alkali, a reducing sugar, amino acids and tannin are added to a cacao mass or nibs of specified pH is disclosed in the Japanese Patent Publication No. 31493/1978. According to this process, composition of raw cacao beans must be determined prior to adding a required amount of the above additives, resulting in a complicated process which cannot sufficiently improve the aroma of cacao.
This prior art had different purposes from that of the present invention in which a further rich aroma may be extracted from cacao beans of high grade to increase cacao aroma and to produce a chocolate of reduced sweetness. Further, in the prior art neither convenient operation nor enough development of aroma may be achieved.